


it's nice to have a friend

by missymeggins



Category: Rizzoli & Isles
Genre: F/F, Post-Finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-28
Updated: 2019-09-28
Packaged: 2020-10-29 22:13:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20803808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missymeggins/pseuds/missymeggins
Summary: i think we can all agree that the ending of rizzoli and isles was the gayest not officially gay thing to ever grace tv. inviting yourself on a platonic trip to paris with your best friend? sure jane. so this is how that platonic trip pans out for them in my head.title courtesy of taylor swift because that song is undeniably gay





	it's nice to have a friend

**Author's Note:**

> i think we can all agree that the ending of rizzoli and isles was the gayest not officially gay thing to ever grace tv. inviting yourself on a platonic trip to paris with your best friend? sure jane. so this is how that platonic trip pans out for them in my head.
> 
> title courtesy of taylor swift because that song is undeniably gay

Somewhere around their second week in Paris Maura becomes acutely aware of just how much time they’ve been spending together. It’s not as though time together is unusual for them, or a bad thing as far as Maura’s concerned. But Paris seems to have eliminated any time apart and Maura begins to wonder if Jane is okay. 

“So what are we doing today?” Jane asks as she exits the bathroom, showered, dressed and far more enthused at an early hour than Maura ever saw her back home in Boston.

So Maura speaks without thinking. “Jane, are you lonely?” she asks with genuine curiosity. 

“Um no?” Jane replies with an easy smile and an almost laugh. “Why on earth would you think that?” she prompts.

Maura hesitates briefly. “It’s just, you’ve slept in my bed almost every night since we got here and you accompany me to places I know you’re not personally interested in visiting. We’ve barely spent a moment apart since we’ve been here and it’s been a while since you’ve had a serious relationship so I just wondered…” she trails off, worried she’s crossed a line.

Jane stops, and as she processes Maura’s words, she starts to consider just how intrusive her presence may have been. She’s never thought about it before because this is just how they are but they’ve been in Paris for nearly two weeks now and that’s the longest they’ve ever spent together without work creating space between them. Jane has barely left Maura’s side this entire time. It hadn’t felt necessary. It just never occurred to her that Maura might actually _want_ space. Somehow Jane never did. It makes her self conscious in a way she’s never felt before. 

“You’re right,” she says shortly. “I’m sorry, I’ve been intruding on your trip. It’s totally inappropriate,” she says, shaking her head in embarrassment.

“No, Jane that’s not what I’m saying at all!” Maura tries to reassure her. “I just thought…” 

But Jane cuts her off again, “I know, it’s weird. It’s too much, I mean who does that?” She shakes her head and it’s more like she’s talking to herself now.

“Does what?” Maura asks confused. 

“Sleeps in their best friend’s bed every night!” Jane answers loudly, arms gesticulating wildly. “Follows them around like a lost puppy,” she adds a little less animatedly. 

Maura laughs, “Jane you are hardly a lost puppy, and you know I love your company. I don’t mind at all that we’ve been spending so much time together or that you’ve been sleeping in my bed.”

“Well why the hell not?” Jane practically shouts, clearly frustrated with herself. “You booked and paid for a suite with two perfectly good beds, why on earth should you be happy that I’ve been hijacking yours every night.”

“It’s hardly the first time we’ve shared a bed,” Maura points out. “And I love you,” she follows up with an easy shrug.

It’s not like they’ve never said those words to each other before - their friendship is long and their jobs are dangerous. But there’s something in the way Maura says it this time that feels different and the mood between them shifts suddenly. 

“As a friend,” Jane adds, as though she’s finishing Maura’s sentence for her. As though she’s in the box in an interrogation, asking questions to get the answers she’s looking for. 

Only Maura didn't finish it like that. She said exactly as much as was true. 

“Jane.” Maura’s face gives her away, tenses in uncertainty to a question that should be easier to answer but isn’t. 

“Maura?” Jane questions, realising for the first moment that there might be something about Maura Isles she doesn’t know. “Tell me,” she asks gently. 

“No Jane, not just as a friend,” Maura answers softly. 

It rushes in on Jane, this revelation that somehow doesn’t seem quite as revelatory as it should. It’s more like when all the pieces of a case suddenly come to together and she can see the bigger picture and the truth is…this makes _sense_.

“How long have you…” Jane trails off, unsure how to finish the sentence. 

Maura avoids her eyes, looking past Jane as she replies, “Does it matter?”

“Maybe? I don’t know.” And suddenly panic sets in and Jane is floundering, uncertain what to say or think or feel. “I mean maybe it’s just hard to say goodbye you know? We’re moving on and maybe that’s what you’re feeling,” Jane offers, but wondering, as she speaks, who exactly she’s trying to rationalise this to and why. 

Maura shakes her head. “No, Jane it’s not because we’re saying goodbye.” She pauses, and confesses quietly, “A long time.”

“So this isn’t just how friends _are_?” Jane laughs awkwardly. “They don’t share beds and have breakfast together every morning and….all that is because you feel…” She leaves the word unsaid, like it’s still too much to actually to acknowledge.

Maura shakes her head. “Jane, no, it’s not that simple. Of course some friends are like that. Plenty in fact.” She shrugs her shoulders. “It’s not…it’s not all those _things_ we do together that makes it more for me. It just is more.” 

“So then what does all that mean about me?” Jane blurts. 

Maura sighs, “Jane you know I can’t answer that for you. Only you know how you feel about this.”

“But I don’t know Maura! That’s the problem. I just thought this was…us.” Her panic rises and it shows in her wild gestures and the pitch of her voice. 

“It is us. The fact that I feel something else doesn’t actually change the way we’ve always been. But it is why I never said anything,” she says with a sigh.

Jane just barrels on. “I mean, I didn’t even know you were into women! Were you keeping that a secret too?”

“It’s not a secret that I think sexuality is fluid Jane. It’s just also never been relevant before.”

“I don’t know what that means Maura!” Her eyes are wide and it’s almost like she’s pleading, like the unspoken words are _make me understand this._

This is not how Maura had envisaged this trip and part of her wishes she could rewind this conversation and just unsay the words but the rest of her feels such a relief at not having to lock it away anymore. She’s never been good at lying. So she tells the truth. 

“It means I’ve always dated men in the past because it was always men I found myself romantically interested in. Until I realised I was also romantically interested in you.”

“So what, I’m the exception to your straightness?” Jane questions.

Maura sighs. “No. You’re just the _person_. Jane, I’ve dated other people and I’ve even been in love with them but it’s never worked out. I think part of the reason for that is because it’s never been easy enough. But you make this so easy. I’m so comfortable with you, I don’t have to hide any part of who I am and that’s a good feeling. It isn’t because you’re a women, it’s just because you’re you.” 

“But ours is the only relationship that’s ever been easy for me too,” Jane admits slowly. “I never thought…I mean it never occurred to me.” 

“Jane…just because I feel this way….it doesn’t mean you…” she can’t finish the sentence though because Jane is looking at her and she’s still again, no trace of panic on her face or in her body and somehow that’s almost more unsettling because now she’s not at all sure what Jane is thinking.

Jane steps forward, bringing her hand to Maura’s cheek and Maura shakes her head a little. “Jane…”

“Shh Maura,” Jane murmurs. “Just let me find out.”

Maura swallows and Jane notices. 

“Maura? You’re shaking.” 

Maura closes her eyes. “I’m scared.” 

“But…you’ve had time to think about this,” Jane replies, surprise in her voice. 

“But I never actually did Jane. Not _this_. I’ve never let myself think about it. Not even for a second. From the moment I realised how I felt about you, I locked the possibility of this away.”

“Maura,” Jane murmurs softly. “Why would you do that?” 

Maura just shrugs. “Our friendship was too important. I couldn’t risk losing you. I need you in my life Jane and I was afraid if you knew it would change things. I never meant to tell you.” 

She looks at Jane like she’s apologising and it breaks Jane. All the tenderness she has ever felt for Maura rushes through her in glaring clarity. She runs her fingers down Maura’s cheek, letting her fingers continue down her jaw to the slender line of her neck as she steps forward, closer this time, until her other hand finds Maura’s waist and she holds her there gently. 

Maura’s breath hitches at the contact. “What if this isn’t what you want Jane? What if I lose you? I’m not ready for that.”

“You will never lose me Maura,” Jane answers.

“But - ”

“I promise,” Jane tells her. 

And her voice is firm but her lips are soft when she presses them against Maura’s. 

She pulls back slowly, eyes locked on Maura’s. “That is…not what kissing men feels like,” she breathes out carefully. 

Maura pulls back, dropping her eyes. “Of course, forget it Jane, we can move on and just pretend it never happened.” 

Jane shakes her head. “No, Maura, look at me.” She lifts Maura’s chin so their eyes meet again. “It’s never felt like that with any man. Not Casey, or Gabriel, not with anyone that I ever thought I loved.”

She’s never felt good at communication but she tries to emphasise the word _thought_ in a way that makes her meaning clear to Maura. 

“Jane?” Maura questions, eyes asking for more. Truth, confirmation that what she wants to hear is what she’s hearing. 

Jane kisses her again and that’s more than good enough. 

Jane smiles as they pull apart. “Why have we not being doing that for years,” she breathes out in exclamation as she tries to catch her breath again. 

Maura laughs in delight and presses another kiss against Jane’s lips. 

“Well, you can’t blame me for that, this is entirely your fault,” she admonishes light heartedly.

“Oh no it’s not,” Jane argues. “This is definitely your fault.” 

“And how do you figure that? You’re the one who took this long to figure out how you felt.”

“Yes,” Jane nods seriously. “But that's because usually you’re the one who tells me things I don’t know, so if you had just _told_ me that this is how I felt about you we could have been doing so much more of this for so much longer,” Jane huffs at her with a grin.

Maura rolls her eyes. “You are impossible.” 

“But you love me anyway,” Jane says, voice softening in a way she has always reserved exclusively for Maura. 

Maura brushes her hand through Jane’s dark curls, marvelling at how good it feels to finally touch her with abandon. 

“Yes I do,” she replies tenderly.


End file.
